Etymologically
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esurio

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Pronunciation

  • Classical: [eːˈsʊ.ri.oː][1]
  • Ecclesiastical: [eˈs̬uː.ri.o][1]

Forms

ēsuriō (present infinitive ēsurīre, perfect active ēsurīvī or ēsuriī, supine ēsurītum); fourth conjugation[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin edō (“to eat”) + -uriō, a desiderative verb built on the stem of the supine ⟨ēsum⟩.[2][1] The verb edō goes back to Proto-Italic *edō and Proto-Indo-European *h₁ed- (“to eat”).[3] Risch thought ⟨ēsurīre⟩ was formed as the opposite of a verb ⟨*saturīre⟩ “to be full”, and that it started the class of desideratives in ⟨-urīre⟩.[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

De Vaan and Köbler date it from Plautus.[3][4]

Semantic evolution

It means to be hungry or to suffer hunger, and transitively to hunger for something, as in Ovid's “there will be nothing there for us to hunger for”.[2][5] Church Latin glosses it “be hungry, hunger for”.[6]

Timeline

  • c. 250–184 BC – Plautus.[3][5][4]
  • 43 BC–18 AD – Ovid uses it transitively.[2][4]
  • 1670s – Its present participle is borrowed into English as esurient.[7]

Meanings

Verb

  1. To be hungry, suffer hunger.[2][5][1]
  2. To hunger for.[2][6]

Word family

  • adēsuriō
  • ēsuriēs
  • ēsurīgō
  • ēsurītiō
  • ēsurītor
  • edō
  • English esurient

Usage notes

Plautus also made a humorous noun ēsuriō, -ōnis “a hungry man”, punning on saturiō “a well-fed man”;[2][5] Petronius has it too.[2][5]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d e f g Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  3. ^ a b c d de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
  4. ^ a b c Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
  5. ^ a b c d e Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  6. ^ a b Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson
  7. ^ Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com